18/Х 1918.

Dear Comrade Berzin!

I have listened to Chernykh and see that things are bad for you.

In the first place, you must be seriously treated.

NB Since the doctors said to lie down, don't leave the sanatorium.

NB If the doctors said "2 hours of work", not a minute more.

Free to refuse appointments, devote 1/4 hour to reports on "matters" and talks on "matters", and 1 3/4 hours to leading the agitation.

Appoint responsible persons:

Peluso2

+ Italian

+ German (Axelrod wasn't at your place? You should beat him up!!! You would have written out of Zirüch Kasher or Schneier, found one of [them] through them and appointed one of [them]).

Ask them: 2-3 leaflets and 1* brochures per week.

You give us materials for compilation.

Give the Russian fools a job: to send here clippings, not random numbers (as these idiots have done so far). Name the people responsible for this (Leiteizen and others) and we'll clamp down on them. You have no responsible people.

The articles of Volksrecht'a3 and other newspapers, which wrote that the Soviets are not for Europe (according to Black), were not sent here. Who should be flogged for this? You should appoint the responsible ones.

2-3 times a week you should have people like Guilbeaux, Hubacher, etc. from Geneva, Italians from Lugano, Germans from Zurich (not like Platten, but better: workers from the Zurich Left). From among them appoint agents, pay both for travel and for work.

Don't give a shit about officialdom: minimum attention.

On publications and illegal travel: maximum attention. I am sending brochures: immediately order (and urgently) translation into all languages.

Publish. Publish. Publish.

Hi!

Your Lenin.

Published in part - "Pravda", No. 17, January 21, 1925.

Fond 2, op. 1, d. 27144 - autograph.

1* Forwarded from: "or".

1The published letter supplements Lenin's recommendations given to Ya.A.Berzin on October 15, 1918 (see: Lenin V.I. Complete Collected Works, vol. 50, pp. 192-193).

2In a letter to Ya.A.Berzin dated October 15, 1918. Lenin suggested: "Peluso can (and should) write three brochures a week (on all topics, compilations on our newspapers - you give the topics and the list of articles to be compiled)" (Lenin V.I. Complete Works, vol. 50, p. 193).

3 "Volksrecht" ("People's Law") - a daily newspaper, the organ of the Social Democratic Party of Switzerland, published in Zurich since 1898.